Tuesday 28 June 2011

A Doggy Routine

It's now eight days we've had Jade, and I have given her a good walk every day.  Because  she's  still  a baby and wakes us up very early, at first I felt very tired, but now I'm beginning to feel the benefits. I'm going to have to put another hole in my belt so I can pull it in further pretty soon. The routine is that in the mornings I bring her down from her bed  next to ours and take her into the garden while she does the necessary. After cleaning that up, I give her some breakfast and have my morning cuppa while I check emails etc. before doing some toning exercises and getting myself  ready for the day.

I work in the house or my office through the morning while she alternates playing with toys or sleeping, mostly supervised by my hubby. I stop for lunch about one, and then we go for our walk.  Jade loves to play on the beach when we go this way.



I'm usually back in the office by three to work until about 5ish when I give Jade her tea. Then I might get a bit more work in until it's time to cook supper. At that point I always used to feel exhausted, but these days I seem to have a bit more energy.

After supper it's time for the cuddles we've both been waiting for all day.  She waits for me on the couch and as soon as I get there she moves over and settles close to me with her head in my lap. She'd stay there all night if I let her, but  once we've checked the news headlines at 10 pm, I click on the lead again and take her around the block for her  final toiletries.  I have to be a bit  careful because our neighbour's cat has taken to following us around, looking as though she is ready to attack Jade at any moment. Jade is not concerned. She's lived with cats in her foster home. It's just me who does the worrying.

When we get back it's bed time, and she waits patiently for me to make sure all is shipshape and collect her bed, then follows me up the stairs and lies down on it. And there she stays until some time between 5 and 6.30 am when she thinks it's time to get up and start all over again.

There are going to be some variations to this. I've just called a dog trainer about taking her to a class, but we won't get that started for a few weeks.  I want to have a day off to go out with a girlfriend now and then, and hubby will take over.  But he can follow the same routine.  Just like with human babies, I believe it's good for dogs to get used to a routine.

Friday 24 June 2011

My Poppy Jungle

This year hubby planted up part of our veg patch with radishes, onions and carrots.  He put in some stakes and planted out the beans that had sprouted from his little seed tray. The first lot of radishes are over. We couldn't eat them quickly enough and some got too big and soft and had to be pulled out and put into the compost bin. Rather than plant another row, he's just thrown another handful of seeds into their area and they are starting to show green shoots now.

Meanwhile, we've had an invasion in the onion patch beside all that. A whole jungle of poppies have seeded themselves and completely overwhelmed the two rows of green onion spikes bravely climbing skywards.  we're not sure how they got there, unless the seeds were in the topsoil we bought when we created the garden two years ago. Apparently poppy seeds can lie dormant underground until you turn the soil and the light gets to them.

When we saw the first of the plants poking through, hubby wanted to pull them out, but I love poppies and said I wanted to see how they came out. Over the weeks more and more came up and turned into the little jungle you see in the picture.  And at last they have started to bloom with these delicate pink flowers.


A friend told me to wait till they'd flowered then lift the plants and move them somewhere more appropriate, so I'll do that if I can find the time; life's still a bit hectic at the moment. And then we'll wait to see how the onions do.  The carrots look to be doing well, and we've already had some meals with the rhubarb that overwintered under an upturned flowerpot.  We also should get some potatoes, as some plants came up from the few we left in the ground last year without realising it.

Monday 20 June 2011

Jade


The newest member of our family has decided that, wherever the dirty laundry is, makes a  good place to nap.

Friday 17 June 2011

New Dog Coming


This little fellow is Ted, whom I've featured before on here because he sometimes comes to visit, and we all love him.  Next time he comes he'll have a little girlfriend to play with because today I've committed to adopting a little female puppy who looks just like him.  We're picking her up on Sunday and then I'll be able to share some photos of her.

Monday 13 June 2011

A Shining Sink

Years ago I was introduced to Flylady.net, a site that helps you keep you home clean and organised. The first thing flylady tells you to do is to shine your sink, and then to do this every night before you go to bed. I took her advice in my last house and got so proud of my kitchen sink I even took a photo of it.



In my new house, I lost my bookmark of her site, and although I try to keep my new sink area clean, it  doesn't shine up the way the old one does, and I've lost the daily cleaning habit. In the last few months, I've let lots of other things slip while I've worried about my son's health and how to earn enough money to keep him as well as my hubby and myself while he's sick. Now he's on the road to recovery, although he won't be earning for a while, and I've found flylady again. I've turned my thoughts back to my home and started on some more of the spring cleaning jobs needed around here.

The garden needs attention too.  And I need to keep reminding myself to stop worrying about everything and start to do one thing.  Then think about what to do next.  That's the way things get done.

Friday 10 June 2011

Pictures Lost and Found

A couple of years ago, we were on holiday overseas and my husband's eagle eyes picked up a camera card that someone had dropped. There was no-one around so he popped it in his wallet and we asked various people we met but couldn't find the owner. Rather sad if it contained someone's holiday snaps, which are such great mementoes. It reminded me of a film of mine that the developers lost when I sent them away. It was a family wedding, from which I can only remember my toddler daughter's outfit for the day, but have no pic of. My daughter was even younger then than her own daughter is now.

Anyway, last month I earnt a little more from my writing than usual, so yesterday I treated myself to a digicam that was on special offer at ebay and greatly reduced. I'm waiting for it to arrive, but when I mentioned it to hubbie, he asked what kind it was. I told him Fujifilm, whereupon he remembered the card, which was still tucked away in his wallet, and fished it out. Lo and behold, it's for a Fujifilm camera.

Maybe I can put it in my new one and find out what, if anything, is on it. Perhaps I can even find the owner if I publish one or two of the pics on the internet. If you've ever lost a camera card with pics on, watch this space.

Tuesday 7 June 2011

A Good Outcome and a Rosy Treat

Between recent hospital visits I was completely spoilt by the friends I was staying with while my son had his brain tumour removed. On Friday morning I was taken to Mottisfont Abbey. I didn't have my camera with me as I hadn't expected a treat like that, but I was able to enjoy it because I knew the operation had been successful and my son was in good hands. The Wessex Neurological Unit at Southampton General Hospital is reputed to be one of the best in the country.

I've written about visits to Mottisfont in previous posts. This time I was completely bowled over by the beauty of the walled garden which contains the national collection of old English roses. If you can imagine the lovely rose arch in the picture with even more of a riot of colour around and below it, you'll get some idea of what it was like last Friday. This year everything is early and really abundant, and it was quite overwhelming.


We're all home now and the boy is doing well.  I'm his carer during his convalescence, so my blogging schedule is still in flux.  See you when I see you.

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